Carbonite Online Backup

Carbonite recently upgraded its Mac version to support the new mac operating system in Lion. Whilst it was not there when I first purchased my Mac and I had to wait a few weeks, they now have it so that you can ensure your most precious files are backed up and secure on your Mac.

We have recently released an update to our Carbonite product for Mac which will enable users running Mac OS X Lion to be able to use Carbonite. This update will occur automatically in the background, you may need to restart your computer for the update to successfully start and complete. If you are currently in Recover Mode, Carbonite will not be updated until you have resumed your backup.

My main reason for blogging is so that I have a place to collect the literally hundred of pictures that I take each and every month – and make some rhyme and reason out of them.

At the end of each year, I take my blog and turn it into a hard cover book…one day, I will gift these books to our kids who will have beautifully bound books of our adventures, complete with narrative. I hope they will enjoy them & share them with generations to come. I love love love looking at old photos of my family.

For every 1 picture you see in my online spaces…
there are most likely another dozen or so at home.

I am sort of a nut about pictures…I just love them.
I have them on memory cards, the computer, (some) backed up to online sharing sites, and the blog. Every once in awhile – I spend a good chunk of time and I back them up to an External Hard Drive as well.

All of this is well and good – as long as nothing ever happens to said devices.
Water damage, fire damage, kid damage?

I’ve contemplated online back up for my entire computer – but didn’t figure I needed it when I really don’t do anything except pictures and blog booking on my home computer…

If I had enough time weren’t so lazy, I could back up all of my pictures to an online photo sharing site and call it good…but again, we’re talking huge volumes of pictures. And the ones I’ve used have started imposing limits…

I have huge volumes of pictures I’d be devastated if I lost.
Last August, on the very same day my Mom lost her battle with cancer, our fence had a lightning strike, which traveled into our house and fried our computer (and our cable box, our modem, blah blah blah.)

Life had been hectic and my pictures were NOT backed up.
Not a one from the summer.

I gave my PC one last chance but it failed me again. Motherboard failed and it would cost me $400 to repair. Luckily Carbonite has online access to your files so that you can access them quickly and from anywhere. It atleast gave me access to my files whilst I decided what to do in terms of a new laptop.

I did eventually buy another one. This time a Mac. Carbonite works with a Mac but there is no way to restore your data from a PC to a Mac. All you can do is manually bring it over and then move the subscription, which means starting your backup all over again. Whilst this last step is very frustrating, having Carbonite did save my ass for the 3rd time in 6 months.

Carbonite has made some great developments in the smart phone app space with the launch of their Android App this week. I thinks its great to see them showing great leadership in this space. As an Android user, its certainly an app I will be adding to my phone this week. Below is an excerpt from the Carbonite blog on the release:

This week we released Carbonite Access for Android – our most feature-rich mobile app to date. If you’re familiar with our iPhone and Blackberry mobile apps, you may have correctly guessed that this free application provides Carbonite subscribers with the ability to quickly and easily access all of their backed up files through their Android phone.

But that’s not all it does. It also enables Carbonite users to easily share their files via email, Facebook, Picasa and many other Android-supported applications, as well as to instantly listen to their backed up music and view their backed up photos directly on their phone.

There are two big advances in the Android app. I think we’re the first backup application to offer thumbnail photo browsing. We take all your backed up photos and compute thumbnails on the fly so that you can browse your pictures just as you would browse locally stored photos on your phone. We pre-cache photos so that when you’re flipping from photo to photo, it’s fast. The other big advance is music playback: when you click on a tune, it starts playing right away – you don’t have to wait for the whole tune to download.

There are many cloud-based applications these days, such as Flickr, mp3tunes.com, Google docs, Picasa, and so forth. The key difference between those services and Carbonite Access, is that your songs, photos, documents, and other files are already backed up to the Carbonite cloud – you don’t have to upload anything. And all you content is available at the touch of a finger in one place.

You’re going to be hearing a lot more about the idea of a “personal cloud.” In a world where you’re always connected, no matter where you are, you should be able to get at any file on any of your computers. When you back up your computers with Carbonite, you are creating a “personal cloud,” and now it’s our job to ensure that you can access it anytime, anywhere.

As personal computers become more powerful and their storage space grows, they have moved into more and more domains of people’s lives. This has led to more and more types of information being stored on them. Initially limited to documents and record, in many cases they also contain books, music, and pictures. In not too much time they may also be holding movies. The impact of potentially losing all of this stuff becomes bigger and bigger. There are many methods of backing this data up, but most users either never back up or do it infrequently. Carbonite Online Backup review provides an economical backup solution that is more likely to be used since it is fully automatic.

Carbonite makes the backup process very simple and automatic. Their service runs on the web. Before a computer is backed up for the first time, a client program is installed on it. There are clients for Macintosh and Windows. They require fairly recent versions of either. This client queues up a list of files to be backed up and sends them one at a time over the Internet to Carbonite’s archive server location. They are encrypted before being sent. The archive server keeps theses files on RAID 6 arrays. These are sets of hard drives that can handle one or two units failing without losing any data.

The design is to back up files that contain user generated content, not all of the files on the system. The client attempts to identify which files should be backed up. The user can modify the selections by adding or deleting files from the backup list. The user can also control at the directory level rather than the file level.

At first, all of the selected files need to be backed up. After this, incremental backups need to be done on changed files and any files that are new to the directories in the list. Checking for new and changed files and backing them up is a continuous, automatic process.

The computer has to be online for data to be sent to the archive center. This approach usually has good performance when used with a high speed connection. It may not work as well with a dialup connection unless limited data is to be backed up. Backing up large amounts of data could cause data transfer quotas to be exceeded. This could be a concern with satellite or cellular Internet connections. Since the data is encrypted using a strong method before being sent, security should not be a big concern.

It is easy to restore files. One must log into the web site from the computer to receive the restore. The request can be for all or just selected files. Directories that are not already present will be established. There is a version of restore called remote access. One can use it to retrieve requested files onto a computer that is not running Carbonite.

Here are three reasons for thinking about using Carbonite. The first and main one is that the backup process becomes automatic. The best backup method is no good if it is not used. Moderately inconvenient computer problems can become disasters if no current backup exists. The second reason is that the cost of backing up any amount of data on one computer is quite moderate. Thirdly, there is no need for more hardware, assuming that an Internet connection is in place. Its important to assess these features for yourself, research online backup review today.

If you have data on a computer that you would really hate to lose, you should think about getting Carbonite Online Backup reviews. Once you have it installed, you will rarely have to give it any thought. It will keep your backups current and available at anytime and anywhere.

For those who haven’t heard about this yet, the Carbonite for iPhone app has already been available for Carbonite users and iPhone owners since early this year. Now you may not always have your laptop with you 24/7 but I’m pretty sure you’re practically joined at the hip with your iPhone. So forget about going home to copy that presentation you have on your desktop because now there’s a much more convenient way for you to access important files even while on the move: get them through your iPhone.

So if you’re not yet altogether convinced about going online for your storage solutions, here’s yet another great reason to consider jumping into the online backup bandwagon, particularly with Carbonite Backup. With the Carbonite for iPhone app, your documents, pictures, presentations, or anything you have entrusted to Carbonite’s servers, are literally right at your fingertips!

Here are the things you can do with Carbonite app on your iPhone or iPod Touch:

• Browse through all the files you have in your Carbonite account.

• View your word documents, presentations, PDF files, pictures, and videos right on your iPhone or iTouch.

• Share any of these files with colleagues, friends, or family members. The documents will be sent as email attachments.

• Access cached files offline or even without Wi-Fi or 3G connection.

Don’t have an iPhone or iPod Touch? Not to worry. You can still access your files by simply logging into your Carbonite account from a remote location through the Remote File Access feature. Just remember that for both features, files from your initial backup, your most recent backup, and those requested for immediate backup are accessible.

And what’s the best thing about these value-added services from Carbonite Backup? They’re absolutely free. You simply have to pay the affordable $55 yearly subscription fee and get to avail of Carbonite’s reliable online backup and storage service, plus Carbonite for iPhone app and other services the company has to offer. Now, that’s online backup at its simplest – and best.

Carbonite has announced the addition of iPad support to its mobile application for remotely accessing files. The Carbonite app allows users to log into their Carbonite account and browse through files that have been backed up using the service. In addition, many file types can be opened directly within Carbonite or attached to e-mails for quick sharing. The iPad release also makes use of caching, creating a quicker browsing experience that loads recent files faster than previous releases. The software is available as a free app in the App Store, but to access all of the features users will need a Carbonite Online Backup account. New customers can try a 15-day free trial or subscribe to a one-year account for $55.

I’ve felt the sting of lost data before, so when I found out that Geek Choice was offering Carbonite off-site data backup services I knew it was time to start backing up my data properly. Like many people I’ve promised myself over and over that I would start keeping backups of my data on flash drives or floppy disks, but I never kept up with the hassle of backing up every time I changed a file.With Carbonite, though, my data is safe even if my resolve wavers.

Carbonite is completely automated backup software. It runs in the background as I do my work. I’ve had it running for a while now and I haven’t had to even think about it since the initial backup finished. It just works. I can see it’s working with the small green and orange dots next to my files, showing me what’s backed up and what’s not. The thing that’s really got me impressed is the speed. While copying over folders full of images and other information, I can watch the green dots catch up with my progress in a matter of minutes.

Off-site backup is always the safest option for your data if you can manage it. I know that no matter what happens to my computer, my local network, or even my home that my data will be safe. Now I can have that piece of mind without trying to set up my own off-site backup or paying a fortune. And now that Geek Choice offers this great service, you can have it installed on your home computer or your entire business network by an expert technician. Safe, easy, and setup by a Geek you can trust – what more could you ask for in a data backup solution?

When it came to backing up my data I always had the attitude that “hey my computer isn’t going to crash” it won’t happen to me until of course that day it did happen to me. Ok no big deal right? I can get my data back right? Well what if you can’t and you don’t have your important files backed up? Well you are shit out of luck my friend all because you failed to do one simple thing and backup your hard drive.

There is no reason especially if you are running a small business that you shouldn’t have some backup in place. You can backup to a zip drive, cd rom, removable usb drive or online backup company like Carbonite where they offer Affordable online backup for your small business. Only $54.95/year for unlimited backup. Try it free!

I recently had several of my blogs hacked and was able to restore it back immediately because I had my database and wordpress files backed up.Don’t let all your hard work go to waste by losing everything you worked so hard. Backup your files as often you can and utilize offsite backup companies like Carbonite.

Recently I had some free time and decided to satisfy my curiosity on whether or not my Carbonite’s online backup program was all it was advertized to be. And because it was I decided to mention it again in a Good Boot.

Carbonite automatically backs up the most important files on your computer and stores them in a secure, offsite location.

Those files include but are not limited to: AppData Local, Locallow and Roaming, Contacts, Desktop, Documents, Downloads, Favorites, Music, Pictures, Programs and Videos. Files that can be easily recovered from any computer.

Carbonite is novice-friendly, installs quickly and easily, works in the background to update your backup without slowing down your computer, “double-encrypts” files so only you can see your files, retrieves your backed up files over the internet with its remote access and “just in case” does not delete a file for two weeks after you delete the file from your had drive.

To retrieve one, several or all your files you simply click on Start > Computer and scroll down to the Carbonite folder. It opens and displays like any Windows Explorer folder all your backed up folders and files. In addition there’s a folder displaying files pending backup.

Carbonite also provides an e-mail warning if for whatever reason a week passes without it being able to back up your data.

As an example: I seldom use our user group laptop between meetings. If I do not boot it for over a week I’ll receive an e-mail sent to my desktop computer alerting me that there has been no recent updated backup of the data on the laptop.

The cost is only $54.95 per “year” for unlimited backup space with no limit on file size.

The only complaint I’ve received concerns the length of time it takes Carbonite to initially upload data. It’s true that depending on Carbonite’s access to your computer and the amount of data to be uploaded, the initial upload may take several days. But once the initial upload is complete, updating the backup is so efficient you’ll not be aware of it.

Carbonite offers a 15 day risk-free, no credit card required full version trial.

I’m not suggesting you forgo backing up to an external hard drive. However keep in mind an external hard drive is nothing more than a hard drive in a box, subject to the same hazzards that can corrupt your computer’s hard drive.

For me Carbonite has become my data security blanket.

Here’s wishing you a Good Boot.

The time has come when you may no longer need to lug a laptop around to get work done. With about $50 worth of apps, you can turn your iPhone or iPod Touch into a true mobile powerhouse.

Brush up on a PowerPoint presentation. Catch up on all your e-mail. Access important files stored on your desktop PC right on your phone. I have six great apps that will help you do this and more. Find links to apps mentioned at www.komando.com/news.

TECH TIPS: Ask Kim

Documents to Go

Do a fair number of presentations or editing Microsoft Word or Excel files? Documents To Go ($10) is right up your alley. It lets you view, create and edit Word and Excel documents. The professional version ($15) adds PowerPoint support.

You can synchronize files with your Windows PC or Mac over Wi-Fi. Or, send and receive files via e-mail. You get a healthy set of features, but not all that are available in Microsoft Office. Files sent from your desktop retain their formatting. You’ll see graphics and tables, along with comments and footnotes/endnotes. The app can also be used to view PDFs and iWork ’08 and ’09 files.

TapIt4Me

The iPhone’s keyboard can be difficult. You’ll want TapIt4Me ($5) for composing documents or long e-mail messages.

Start by creating “snippets.” A snippet consists of a phrase and an abbreviation. When you type the abbreviation, TapIt4Me replaces it with the phrase. For example, “brb” is expanded to “be right back.”

Use the notes feature to compose a message. Expand a single abbreviation, or create an entire e-mail message from several abbreviations. Then, copy and paste the note into another app. The app includes a number of snippets. You can edit, delete or keep any or all of them.

Print n Share for advanced printing@

At some point, you’ll want to print content stored on your iPhone. Print n Share for advanced printing ($7) lets you print files and Web pages. Or, print contacts, e-mail messages and photos.

Print n Share works with any printer available to your computer. You can print from your Wi-Fi network, or use your cellular connection to print from afar.

Carbonite

Access your online backup files on the go with Carbonite’s iPhone app. (Full disclosure: Carbonite is one of my national radio show’s sponsors.) The app is free, but you’ll need to subscribe to Carbonite.

The way the app works is simple. Carbonite on your desktop backs up your files to Carbonite’s servers. You can then access all of these files on your iPhone. View photos, brush up on a PowerPoint presentation or review documents.

The app also lets you e-mail files directly from your phone. That makes it easy to share and access files anywhere. Access your files over cellular and Wi-Fi networks.

ScanR Business Center

ScanR Business Center Pro ($25) turns your iPhone into a scanner and fax machine. Since it requires a camera, iPod Touch users won’t reap its full benefits.

Use your iPhone’s camera to scan documents, business cards and more. Then, convert them into PDF files. The PDFs are searchable, so you can search for specific text within finished files.

Once you scan a document, fax it to anyone around the world. Or, use a nearby fax machine as a printer. Faxing is free. Your scans and faxes are stored online. You can access them from any Web browser or iPhone. You can also convert scans to editable documents via scanR’s site.

Dropbox

Dropbox (free) makes it easy to transfer files to your iPhone. It works with Dropbox’s online service, which synchronizes files between computers. A 2-gigabyte account is free.

Access your Dropbox account on the go. View files and download them to your iPhone for offline viewing. Changes made on a computer are synchronized to your iPhone.

You can share links to your Dropbox files with others. Or, take photos and videos with your iPhone and upload them to Dropbox.

Kim Komando hosts the nation’s largest talk radio show about computers and the Internet. To get the podcast or find the station nearest you, visit www.komando.com/listen. To subscribe to Kim’s free e-mail newsletters, sign up at www.komando.com/newsletters. Contact her at gnstech@gannett.com.

I kept reading about all of these different viruses and whatnot out there that were ruining people’s computers. I kept thinking that it would never happen to me, but then I got a virus on my computer. It was not that bad but it made me realize that I was not immune. So, I started using carbonite to back up my data. I knew that if I did nothing then I was risking losing a lot of valuable information. I feel a lot more comfortable knowing that my information is safe and even if I do get a virus, it will be all right.

Carbonite claims that Carbonite Pro will differ from their consumer offerings by providing business-specific features, including SSL data encryption, automatic backup, and data administration services.

As Carbonite CEO David Friend explained in a statement, “Now we have a version of Carbonite that incorporates everything that these small-business users have been asking for: no per-PC fees, administrative tools that are simple enough for any office manager to use, the ability to back up external drives and priority support.”

According to Carbonite’s numbers, more than 100,000 SMBs already use Carbonite’s consumer product, which provides unlimited backup for $54.95 per year per computer. With Carbonite Pro will come a tiered pricing structure following a month-long free trial. The prices range from $10 a month for up to 20GB to $250 a month for 300GB to 499GB. Carbonite insists there are no licensing or setup fees.

Users will be able to access and manage their files via their Carbonite web acount. A central administrator dashboard monitors the activity. Carbonite also claims the user files are encrypted before leaving a user’s computer. Carbonite’s Restore Wizard walks users through data recovery, step by step. An administrator can deny specific access and disable accounts should an employee leave the company.

Hopefully Earl’s link will work for you. If it doesn’t invest in an USB external drive enclosure that matches your drives dimensions. Take the Drive out of the dead computer and hook it up to a computer that is functional. The other computer should recognize it and allow you to browse the directory structure and move any files that you want to make sure to have a copy of. You then have two options you can either Buy a new HD and reinstall Windows or you can reinstall on the old HD just keep in mind everything will be wiped out.

I also Highly recommend a service such as carbonite. It is important to continue to have backups locally as well but they do and will fail at the wrong time. The nice thing with Carbonite and other services like that, they have invested in the infrastructure to have multiple layers of redundancy so the likely hood of them loosing your data is very very slim.

Let us know if you need any more help. I know there are several of us IT guys out here.